KUALA LUMPUR (May 31): IRIS Corp Bhd Bhd reported its largest net loss to date of RM291.92 million for the fourth quarter ended March 31, 2017 (4QFY17) due mainly to a one-off non-cash impairment arising from the group’s corporate restructuring plan.

This compares with a net profit of RM1.52  million reported by the group for 4QFY16, and a net loss of RM1.79 million for 3QFY17.

Revenue for the quarter rose 13.83% to RM119.35 million from RM104.84 million in 4QFY16m, the group said in a filing with Bursa Malaysia.

Iris said that during the quarter, its core business — from its Trusted Identification and Payment & Transportation divisions — saw a 21.1% rise in revenue to RM111.2 million due to the higher delivery volume of Senegal eID cards.

The group’s Sustainable Development and Industrial Building Systems Division recorded a 75.5% decrease in revenue to RM2.7 million as it recognised lower contributions from the Rimbunan Kaseh and Sentuhan Kasih programmes from state governments and Felda respectively.

The Food and Agro Technology division recorded a RM2.8 million increase in revenue to RM3.2 million, thanks to higher revenue from farm produce.

IRIS’ education segment also saw revenue rising by 31.36% on higher student enrolment charges.

For FY17, IRIS recorded a net loss of RM318.95 million compared with a net profit of RM6.05 million for FY16.

Revenue was down 11.3% to RM422.49 million from RM476.31 million in FY16 due to lower revenue from the group’s Tanzania e-ID cards project, Sustainable Development projects for the state government and FELDA respectively, and non-renewal of the Malaysian ePassport project.

“The lower revenue was partially offset by higher revenue from delivery of banking cards for local financial institutions and Senegal eID cards project,” IRIS said.

“The impairment comprise of goodwill and assets of RM160.8 million for non-core business divisions such as IRIS Agrotech, IRIS Koto, IRIS Land, and Stamford College. If (we) exclude the impairment and other exceptions of RM263.6 million, the group would have posted a loss before taxation of RM48.6 million for FY17,” it said.

Shares in IRIS fell 0.5 sen or 2.94% to 16.5 sen today,  on volume of 11.67 million shares. The group has a market capitalisation of RM370.79 million.